Jenny Kurinczuk is Professor of Perinatal Epidemiology in the Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford. She graduated in Medicine from Leicester University in 1985. Following her MSc in epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine she completed her doctorate and training in Public Health Medicine in Leicester. This was followed by seven years working in Western Australia and she returned to the UK in 1999. Jenny joined the NPEU in October 2003 and she has been the Director since 2011. She is also Director of the DH-funded NIHR Policy Research Unit in Maternal and Neonatal Health and Care based in the NPEU. Jenny’s research focuses on the causes and consequences of conditions from conception through pregnancy which affect mothers, their pregnancy outcomes and the health of babies as they develop during infancy, childhood and beyond. Jenny is national programme lead for the MBRRACE-UK/PMRT collaboration responsible for the national confidential enquiries and surveillance of maternal and perinatal deaths, and development of the national Perinatal Mortality Review Tool. She is also a collaborators on studies of serious and ‘near miss’ maternal morbidity through the UK Obstetric Surveillance System (UKOSS) and the UK Midwifery Study System (UKMidSS). Her mission, and that of the NPEU, is to conduct methodologically rigorous research to provide evidence to improve the care provided to mothers, babies and their families and to promote the effective use of resources by perinatal health services.
